Three Types of Mowers – Review & My Opinion

Lawn Tractor

My yard is 40,000 square feet of mostly turf-type tall fescue. Now, the first mower that I had all along is the tractor. I’ve had a tractor for 20 years that I’ve lived in my big house, and they treat me very well. And it’s always been a Craftsman tractor. In fact, this is my second. The first one I had was a green one.

So secretly, before I bought this house, I looked at my measure of success was to, I wanted to have a house that was a big enough yard that I could have a lawn tractor. And this was it.

I’ve always mowed it with a tractor until last year. All right, let’s start with the tractor.

Pros

First and foremost, easy to drive.

Very simple steering wheel. I never worry about it tipping.

It is easy enough for my kids. When they were young, I would teach them how to drive it, and let them start mowing the lawn, and let them have some responsibility for it.

It gave me a decent cut.

It works best with side discharge.

Cons

Very slow

Cost per mow too high

Final Words

The lawn tractor is the easiest to drive. You can have your kids do it. You can do more than mow with it. And you can use it for a snowplow. You can pull things with it. The disadvantages are the turning radius and the slow mowing speed.

TimeMaster – Gas Mower

The cool thing about the TimeMaster is it comes with the bag. It comes with the ability to side discharge. If you want a container, the bag goes right here. And that plugin there, if you take that plug out, it lets all the clippings come out of the back into the bag, and it works well.

But the magic to this mower is that plug right there. I say magic because the mulching capability on that mower when the plug is installed is second to none. I have not… Neither one of these mowers can compare when you’re talking about mulching.

Pros

The cut quality is excellent, the clippings are so beautiful. You just don’t see them at all.

I love the personal pace. You rule the mower, not him

Very Cheap

Main Cons

My only complaint about it is the gas tank is too small, and it’s got this foam thing inside it. So when you fill it up with gas, it tends to overflow because you can’t see how much gas is in it until it’s too late, and then it starts spilling out. So that’s a pain in the neck. That’s the only complaint about it. And I can barely get my whole front and back done on one fill of gas.

Cub Cadet Ultima – Zero Turn Mower

Cub Cadet Ultima is a 42-inch, which is the same deck size as the Craftsman tractor, 42-inch. By the way, the Toro Lawn Tractor is 30-inch. But 42-inch is the biggest that will fit through my gate on that side of the house as well as the shed in the backyard. So that’s why I went with a 42-inch. They also come much bigger up to 54-inch. But 42-inch is the smallest, and it’s perfect for this yard.

However, my commitment to them is done. I’m giving you my honest opinion on this. And honestly, I love this mower.

It’s so much fun to drive. I love the Zero Turn. If you’ve never driven a Zero Turn, it’s a new experience. I got to tell you, compared to the lawn tractor. So that is something I recommend if you’ve got a decent-sized lawn, maybe 15,000 square feet.

In my opinion, this is a little bit too big for my yard (15 000 feet), because I do have a lot of obstructions. And although this is a Zero Turn, if you turn it on a dime, that is one wheel going in one direction and one wheel going in the other direction, it will tear up your grass. It just happens. And I’ll show you some examples of that.

Side discharge and bagging is the best cut with this. I’m not happy with the mulch kit, but the side discharge works excellent. The only trouble is, it blows out a lot of air, and it gets the grass clippings all over the place. So the next step is I’m going to evaluate them, not undercut quality. They all have good cut quality.

Pros

The Zero Turn is the fastest mow!

It is undoubtedly the most agile

Most comfortable to turn.

Cons

High-priced

Testing Each Type of LawnMowers

But what I’m going to assess them on is their Time Master. And that is, how quickly I can mow in my yard each one of them. Now, when mowing with any mower, what kills you is the turns. That’s the thing that slows you down and takes the most time. So it always is more efficient to mow in the longest direction of your yard.

When I try and mow this way, which I occasionally do to prevent compaction, that just takes twice as long, it feels like because I’m turning around twice as much. So I’m going to try three tests. The first one is going to be going in this direction. And I’m going to use the video timer to be my stopwatch.

Test number two is going to be going in this direction, perpendicular to the original. That is going to be the shortest distance. Test number three is going to be on the diagonal, the same as the first two, but with 45 degrees. Of course, the lawn tractor lost all three of those tests, because it is just so painful to turn around. It’s tough to most stripes with a lawn tractor.

It’s much more efficient just to do circles around the yard, but that’s not good for the grass. The Zero Turn is the most valuable. It is effortless to turn the thing. You just have to be careful about tearing up the grass. And the TimeMaster, with itself repelled, this is easy to set as well, mainly because of that personal pace. Let’s take a closer look at that.

You don’t even realize what I’m doing there. Let me back it up. In slow motion, you can see I’m not even behind the mower, and I can squeeze the trigger, and get it to go without having to move. So it optimizes my steps. Okay, let’s look at the pros and cons of each.

And the only disadvantages are that it’s rough on the grass and of course, it is the most expensive.

Now, looking at the price for performance, approximately the cost of the Zero Turn, $2,700, the TimeMaster, $1,100, and I valued the lawn tractor would be about 1,850. Then I broke down the cost per mow.

And the way that I did that is I used my average from last year, I did 40 mows, and I figured the lifespan of these machines would be ten years.

So if you take the price and you divide it by ten years, then divide it by 40 mows, this is what comes out to the cost per mow.

Analysis of three types of LawnMowers

Mower

Zero Turn

Gas Mower

Lawn Tractor

Price (approximately)

$2,700

$1,100

$1,850

Cost per mow (price/10 year, after you divide into 40 mows)

$6.75

$2.75

$4.63

Mow Time (15, 000 sq. feet)

13.5 min

27.5 min

25 min

Difference

-

-104%

-86%

Cost per mile

$6.75

$5.62

$8.60

Conclusion

But now, let’s take a look at mow time. I can mow my lawn front and back with:

The Zero Turn in 13 and a half minutes.

The TimeMaster 27 and a half

and the lawn tractor 25 minutes.

Now, no surprise there. The Zero Turn is the fastest. The TimeMaster is 104% slower than the Zero Turn, and the lawn tractor is 86% slower than the Zero Turn.

Now, when you use that difference to adjust the cost per mow, look at what happens.

The Zero Turn stays the same;

The TimeMaster is still the cheapest $5.62 per mile;

but the lawn tractor goes up to $8.60. It’s the highest cost per mow when adjusted for its performance.

So bottom line, I would only recommend the lawn tractor if you are going to use it for something else, such as pushing a snowplow, pulling a work cart, or mounting a big sprayer on the back.

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